Unit I

Introduction to Petrochemicals
Petrochemicals
• Compounds or elements derived from petroleum or natural gas (NG)
• having the same chemical composition, structure and properties of the same
chemicals derived from non-petroleum sources.
• Ex: Methanol
- can be petrochemical when formed from syngas (derived from petroleum or
NG)
- Can be chemical when formed by destructive distillation of wood
• Thus petrochemical is not a class of compounds. It refers to the origin of the
compound.
Petrochemical Industry
• takes the feed stock from petroleum refineries or NG processing units and
convert them into value added intermediates or end products called
petrochemicals.
• Petrochemicals touch everyday of our life such as:
textiles, automobiles, fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, dyes, pesticides, cosmetics,
paint, electronic devices, construction, and appliances.
• The global petrochemicals market size was valued at USD 539.3 billion in
2018.
• Expected to register a CAGR of 8.5%
Structure of
Feedstock
Petrochemical Natural Gas , NGL, Condensate, Refinery gases
Naphtha, Kerosene, Wax, Gas oil
Industry
Processes
Steam Reforming, Steam Cracking ,
Catalytic Reforming

Primary (or) First Generation Petrochemicals

Syn Gas, Olefins (Ethylene, Propylene, Butenes Butadiene),
Aromatics (Benzene, Toluene , Xylenes, Ethylbenzene)

Oxygen , Ammonia, Oxidation, Ammoxidation, Secondary (or) Second Generation Polymerization,

Chlorine Chlorination, Petrochemicals Alkylation
Dehydrogenation Ethylene Glycol, Acrylonitrile, Styrene

Third Generation Petrochemicals (or) End Products

Synthetic Fibres, Synthetic Rubber,

Synthetic Plastics SBR, BR, Intermediates & Misc. Products
Nylon 6
LDPE, HDPE, LLDPE, Dyes Drugs, Detergents ,
Polyester, Acrylic Chloroprene, Fertilizers , Pesticides
PVC , PP Isoprene etc
Fibre
Primary (Or) First Generation Petrochemicals
Historical Perspective of Petrochemical Industry
• Birth and Growth of much of the petrochemical industries took place in 20th
century starting from US.
• Second half of the 20th century has seen the growth of petrochemical industry
in Western Europe and Japan.
• Later part of 20th century witnessed the growth of petrochemical industry in
China and India.
• Much of the growth was during and after World war-II
• Increased demand for high octane aviation gasoline during the World War – II
spurted the growth of petroleum refineries.
• Increased demand for synthetic rubber resulted in the increased demand of
styrene which in turn the demand for benzene and ethylene, thus spurted the
growth of petrochemical industries
Historical Perspective of Petrochemical Industry …
• Demand for polymers, explosives, fibers, rubber, pesticides, dyes, paints etc.
also increased.
• Initial industrial sources to produce organic chemicals were coal, wood,
natural rubber, cotton, jute, oils, fats and other plant and animal sources.
• Limited, laborious and cumbersome to process.
• Petroleum and natural gas - increased availability and convenience in large
scale handling replaced the above mentioned sources
• Today 95% of the organic chemicals are based on the petrochemicals.
• 10% of petroleum processed in refineries is utilized as feed stock for
petrochemical industries.
• This share will go up to 40% in the next decade.
Important Milestones in Petrochemicals
Important Milestones in Petrochemicals
Important Milestones in Petrochemicals
 Petrochemical Industries …
• Petrochemical Industries are highly technology driven and capital intensive
• Efforts and resources are continuously invested for technological and
engineering developments of petrochemical industries to reduce the cost of
production through:
 Scaling up the plant’s size
Continuous catalyst upgradation to increase yield
Reducing energy consumption
Novel process routes
Adopting milder process conditions
Cheaper and safer raw materials
Important Developments in Petrochemical Industries
Upgradation of steam cracking furnaces
Catalytic reforming process
Effective Fluidized Catalytic Cracking (FCC) gas recovery system
Developments in separation processes like liquid-liquid extraction, extractive
distillation, adsorption, absorption etc., due to the invention of new
adsorbents, solvents etc.
Ex: Linde Division of Union Carbide developed synthetic zeolites as molecular
sieve adsorbents MOLSIV in 1949.
 Important Developments in Petrochemical Industries …
Developments of important separation processes such as;
Udex Process – Separation of aromatics in reformate
Sorbex Processes:
Molex - Separation of normal paraffins from branched and
cyclic components
Parex – Separation of para-xylene from a mixed C8 aromatic
stream
Olex - Separation of olefins from paraffins
made possible,
Aromatics from Non-aromatics for BTX production
paraffins from kerosene stream for LAB
recovery of high purity p-xylene for PTA and PET fibers production
Olefins from C4 and C5 streams
Top 10 countries in World Chemical sales

• Petrochemicals constitute 40% of world chemicals market.

Petrochemicals
• Plastics and fertilizers are the two largest groups of petrochemical sector.
• Plastics is the fastest-growing group of all the bulk materials such as steel, aluminium
or cement.
Petrochemicals …
• The United States, Europe, and other advanced economies currently use up to 20 times as
much plastic and up to 10 times as much fertilizer as India, Indonesia, and other
developing economies on a per capita basis.
• Underscoring the huge potential for growth in developing economies.
Some of the key players operating in the global petrochemicals market are;
BASF SE (Germany), SABIC (Saudi Arabia), LyondellBasell Industries Holdings B.V. & Royal
Dutch Shell PLC (Netherlands), TOTAL (France), Reliance Industries Limited & Indian Oil
Corporation Limited (India), Chevron Phillips Chemical Company (US), BP PLC (UK), Sumitomo
Chemical Company (Japan), China National Petroleum Corporation (China), Dow DuPont (US),
and China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation (China).
Global Petrochemicals Market, by Type, 2018 (USD Billion)

 Ethylene accounted for the largest market share of 26%

 Others mainly include Ammonia, C4 olefins.
Seven building blocks
• Ammonia (NH3) – 185 million tons/Year.
80% used for nitrogenous fertilizers ( More than half of ammonia is converted
to urea). Rest for nitric acid, explosives, acrylonitrile etc.
• Methanol (CH3OH) – 100 million tons/Year
40% is converted to formaldehyde and rest into plastics, plywood, paints,
explosives and textiles. It is also used in antifreeze, solvents, fuels for vehicles,
and as an energy carrier.
• Ethylene (C2H4) and propylene (C3H6) - collectively referred to as light olefins
– 255 million tons/Year.
Mostly converted to PE and PP. Also into glycols and other derivatives.
Seven building blocks…
• Benzene (C6H6), toluene (C7H8) and mixed xylenes (C8H10) – collectively
referred to as BTX aromatics
• – 110 million tons/Year
Processed into fiber intermediates, components in transportation, surface
coatings etc.
Consumption of plastic by

End-use sector Type of resin

Oil and Natural Gas demand in 2017 by sector

• Petrochemicals absorbs approximately 14% of oil and 8% of natural gas.

• Petrochemicals and their derivatives will account for more than a third of oil
consumption in 2030 and nearly half of oil consumption in 2050.
Petrochemicals …
• The petrochemicals produced today is also been pursued from a variety of
other feed stocks such as biomass, coal, CO2, CBM, coke oven gas, flue gases
from industries.
• This could potentially lead to the “petro” prefix becoming redundant.
Choice of Feed Stock
• Ammonia and methanol are produced from oil, natural gas, coal, biomass, and water but the
yield is the highest from natural gas.
• Olefins are produced from oil (Naphtha), NGL and Methanol (MTO)
• BTX is produced from Oil (Naphtha)
Key message • Multiple feedstocks can be utilized to make the same product, but with significant
variations between the amount of input required.
Choice of Feed Stock…
• Specific product Vs balanced portfolio of products.
• Availability and therefore cost of feed stocks varies substantially between
regions.
• Feedstock costs can be between 15% and 85% of the production costs of
petrochemicals, depending on the choice of feedstock.
• Crude oil has a similar price across the globe whereas, natural gas prices can
vary by a factor of 4.
• Feedstock advantage and domestic demand are key drivers for growth.
• Competitive landscape shifted recently due to major developments in North
American shale gas and coal to chemicals industry emergence in China.
• Future growth will be dominated by China and North America, followed by
Asia Less China (including India) and Middle East.
Petrochemical Industry in India
• First Petrochemical plant of 20,000 tpa naphtha cracker was set up by Union
Carbide (India) Ltd. (UCIL) to produce ethylene in 1963 at Mumbai.
• Second naphtha cracker of 60,000 tpa was commissioned by National Organic
Chemicals Limited (NOCIL) in 1968 at Thane.
• Large scale first public sector integrated petrochemical complex was set up by
Indian Petrochemical Corp. Ltd. (IPCL) in 1970 at Vadodara.
• Petrochemical industry gathered momentum in 1970s due to three major
developments.
• Firstly on the supply side, the domestic production of hydrocarbons increased
substantially with the discovery of natural gas in the country and development of
petroleum refineries.
• Thus the feed stocks became available for the production of petrochemicals.
Petrochemical Industry in India…
• Secondly on the demand side, robust consumption growth for synthetic plastics,
fabrics, rubber, detergents and a host of other petrochemical products due to
economic reforms initiated in 1991.
• Thirdly emphasis on import substitution for petrochemicals, the scale of operation,
public/private mix of investments and the nature of competition.
• The Indian petrochemical industry is the fastest growing in the world and the
fastest growing industrial sectors in India today.
• Location Advantage - Future East West Connect
India could establish close contacts with West Asia, Africa and Europe from the
western coast and Southeast and East Asia from the eastern coast.
• India's proximity to middle east countries provide access to petrochemical
feedstocks at low cost.
Ex: RIL and Saudi Aramco collaboration.
Petrochemical Industry in India…

• Eleven naphtha, Gas and dual feed cracker complexes in operation with combined ethylene,
propylene and butadiene capacity of about 7.05, 5.1 and 0.5 MMTPA respectively.
Scenario of Indian Petrochemical Industry in 2018-19
Primary or First Generation Petrochemicals
Product Installed Capacity Production Imports Exports
(Kilo Tons)
Ethylene 7377 6696 25 0
Propylene 5174 5187 0 0
Butadiene 550 495 2 143
Benzene 2375 1839 0 1264
Toluene 175 140 400 0
p-Xylene 5786 5377 800 1525
o-Xylene 420 345 10 105
Mixed Xylenes 90 62 185 0
Methanol 631 200 1730 0
Scenario of Indian Petrochemical Industry in 2018-19 …
• Six aromatic complexes in operation with a combined p-xylene capacity of
about 5.5 MMTPA.
• RIL’s p-Xylene capacity is about 11% of global production and it is the world's
second largest producer.
Scenario of Indian Petrochemical Industry in 2018-19
Secondary or Second Generation Petrochemicals or Intermediates
Product Installed Production Imports Exports
Capacity
(Kilo Tons)
Purified Terephthalic Acid 7377 6686 188 415
Mono Ethylene Glycol 2215 2089 630 140
Caprolactam 70 85 60 0
Vinyl Chloride 996 974 485 0
Phthalic Anhydride 349 290 130 0
Styrene 0 0 845 0
Acrylonitrile 41 0 165 0
Isopropanol 70 72 110 11
Scenario of Indian Petrochemical Industry in 2018-19
Third Generation Petrochemicals or End Products
Product Installed Production Imports Exports
Capacity
(Kilo Tons)
Synthetic Fibres/Yarn 4371 3625 260 1001
Polymers 10112 9276 4751 1188
Synthetic Rubber 425 308 608 52
Synthetic Detergent 687 743 206 1
Intermediates
Performance Plastics 2817 1719 583 1051

 Synthetic Fibers/Yarn: Polyester, Nylon, Polypropylene, Spandex

 Polymers: LDPE, LLDPE, HDPE, PP, PVC, PS
 Synthetic Rubber: SBR, PBR, NBR,EVA,EPDM
 Synthetic Detergent Intermediates: LAB, Ethylene Oxide
 Performance Plastics: PET, SAN, ABS, Nylons, PMMA, Teflon
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